1. Technical Field
Various embodiments of the present disclosure relate to nonvolatile memory cells and memory cell arrays using the same and, more particularly, to nonvolatile memory cells having a lateral coupling structure and memory cell arrays using the same.
2. Related Art
Nonvolatile memory devices retain stored data even if their power supplies are interrupted. Various structures of the nonvolatile memory devices capable of being electrically programmed and erased have been suggested. A typical unit memory cell of nonvolatile memory devices employs a stack gate structure. This includes a gate insulation layer, which is also referred to as a tunnel insulation layer, a floating gate for storing data, an inter-gate dielectric layer, and a control gate which are sequentially stacked on a semiconductor substrate. Recently, as the size of an electronic device decreased and the semiconductor device manufacturing technology advances, various semiconductor devices that perform various functions are emerging as a key component in advanced digital products. For example, logic devices and memory devices are included in a single semiconductor chip to form a system-on-chip (SOC) device. Accordingly, a manufacturing technique has been required for an embedded nonvolatile memory device which is embedded in the SOC.
In order to manufacture the embedded nonvolatile memory device, the logic device and the nonvolatile memory device are fabricated in the same process step. A logic device such as a Metal Oxide Semiconductor (MOS) device typically employs a transistor of single gate structure. Therefore, when the nonvolatile memory device employing the stacked gate structure is formed on the same substrate with the logic devices, manufacturing processes become very complicated. In order to solve this problem, a single poly nonvolatile memory device of a single gate structure, which is a non-stacked gate structure, has been utilized more widely as the embedded nonvolatile memory device. That is, complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) process technologies for fabricating logic devices may be readily applied to fabrication of nonvolatile memory devices employing a single poly nonvolatile memory device.